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Barhebraeus, Butyrum Sapientiae, Physics

Introduction, Edition, Translation, and Commentary

Jens Ole Schmitt, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main

This volume offers the first critical edition and English translation of the Book of Physics of Barhebraeus' (d. 1286) magnum opus, Butyrum Sapientiae. Barhebraeus' text is not simply a Syriac translation of Aristotle or Avicenna; it offers some unexpected and un-Aristotelian views on time, motion, and inclination, thus adding various personal twists and turns to the work. For his Book of Physics Barhebraeus drew mainly on Arabic texts by Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, among them the as yet unedited al-Mulakhkhaṣ, and maybe in some instances the lost al-Jawhar. There are also some remarkable similarities with the late Neo-Platonic philosopher Damascius (6th ct.), especially in Barhebraeus' treatment of time and motion, and also with Lucretius. Thus, the present volume argues, the Book of Physics was based on a variety of sources, which were re-arranged in a unique and very personal manner by Barhebraeus.

Biographical note

Readership

This edition will be of interest for scholars of Syriac, classics, philosophy, and Late Neo-Platonism.

Table of contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface and Acknowledgments
Abbreviations

I Introduction
I.1 Transmission of the Text
I.2 Notes on BH’s Language and Style
I.3 Structure of the Text
I.4 Natural Doctrine
I.4.1 Nature
I.4.2 Matter and Form
I.4.2.1 Privation
I.4.2.2 Terminology of the Elemental Body
I.4.3 Principles and Causes
I.4.4 Creation
I.4.5 Chance and Luck
I.4.6 Place
I.4.7 Void
I.4.8 The General Concept of Time, Motion,
Place,
Spatial Distance, and the
Body’s Divisibility
I.4.8.1 Restraint from Applying the Concept
I.4.8.2 The Now and the Moment
I.4.8.3 Time as a Measure and Its Conservation
I.4.8.4 Three Times
I.4.8.5 Definitions and Categories of Motion
I.4.8.6 Classification of Motion
I.4.8.7 Motion Through a Medium
I.4.8.8 Quies Media
I.4.8.9 Fast and Slow Motion
I.4.9 Inclination
I.4.9.1 Laws of Motion
I.4.10 God
I.4.11 Kinds of Proof of Existence
I.5 Sources
I.5.1 Lucretius
I.5.2 Damascius
I.5.3 Variants in the Sources Used by BH
I.6 Text Book and Commentary
I.7 Ancient Authorities

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